Analysing Advertisements (DP IB English A: Language and Literature: HL): Revision Note

Analysing Advertisements

Paper 1 asks you to analyse unseen non-literary texts. A non-literary text broadly means a text that is not a novel, poetry, drama or literary non-fiction (such as a memoir). While you cannot predict what type of text will come up in the exam, it is a good idea to practise analysing common text types so that you are familiar with typical features and conventions of a variety of texts.

One type of text you may be asked to analyse is advertisements.

Here we will cover these aspects of analysing advertisements:

• Overview of advertisements

• Advertisements: genre norms 

• How to analyse advertisements

• Advertisements: Paper 1 model answer

Overview of advertisements

Print and video ads are visual texts that aim to attract customers’ attention to a brand or product. 

In order to convincingly analyse an ad, you need to be able to make detailed, specific claims about what it is trying to do and why (see more in Approaching Unseen Non-Literary Texts: Purpose, Audience, Context). 

Purpose

The purpose of an ad is the reason it was made. To effectively identify the purpose of the ad, ask yourself:

• What is the writer trying to achieve?

• What is the writer trying to make the audience feel/think/do?

While it seems logical to conclude that ads are trying to sell a product, this is not always the case. Other possible purposes to consider include:

• Raising brand awareness

• Aligning a brand with a topic or trend

• Associating a brand with a value in the audience’s mind

• Creating controversy to gain publicity

• Persuading the audience to buy, support, feel, or think something

Audience 

The intended audience of an advertisement is who the ad is targeted at and who it was made for. To effectively identify the intended audience of the ad, ask yourself:

• Who is the ad aimed at?

• What type of person would notice/pay attention to/be interested in/be impacted by the ad?

  • Consider age, gender, demographics, interests, lifestyle, values, concerns

Context 

The context is the facts of time and place that influence how and why an advertisement was made. To effectively identify the context of the ad, ask yourself:

• When was the text made?

• Where was the text made?

• What economic/political/cultural/social factors influence how the text was made and how it might be received (i.e., the context of production and the context of reception)?

Advertisements: genre norms

Criterion B in Paper 1 assesses your ability to analyse how a text achieves a purpose or has an impact on the audience. While many textual features can be found across text types, some are specific to certain text types.

Here, we will examine some genre norms and techniques that are frequently found in advertisements.

Advertisements are multi-modal texts, that is, they make use of both visual and textual elements. You need to be able to interpret how these elements work and how they work together. 

Ads often use one of these broad techniques that may influence the specific stylistic choices:

• Humour

• Bandwagon effect (doing/thinking something because it seems popular)

• Controversy

• Testimonial (a celebrity or trusted expert endorses the product/brand) 

• Problem-benefit (the ad identifies a problem and offers its product as the solution to the problem)

Not all of these stylistic features are found in all ads, but it is a good idea to look out for them as you begin to annotate and analyse any advertisement.

Advertisements: Paper 1 model answer

Below is a top-mark answer to the following Paper 1 question on an advertisement. We’ve included where the answer has hit the assessment criteria to show you exactly why it would achieve full marks. 

The 2018 Nike ad features NFL player Colin Kaepernick and aims to align the sports apparel brand with the Black Lives Matter movement and wider calls for racial equality and protests against police brutality. Kaepernick famously took the knee, or refused to stand, during the US national anthem as a protest against police brutality. He was subsequently dropped from his team, and his football career declined. Nike’s ad is an example of brand activism as it cleverly and effectively aligns the brand with pressing social issues and encourages the audience to stand up for what is right.

Visually, the ad puts Kaepernick and what he stands for at the centre. The connotation of the black and white colour scheme effectively sets the tone and mood as serious but dignified. The black, white and grey colours give the ad a pared-back feel, with little to distract from Kaepernick’s face and message. The graphic weighting of the lights in his eyes draws us to him and emphasises his emotion and humanity. This is enhanced by the fact that the close-up of his face and his direct gaze at the viewer demand that we focus on him and meet his gaze. His facial expression conveys the seriousness of the topic, but also his determination to protest. 

The textual elements build on these visuals to urge the audience to stand up for what they believe in. The centred, white copy “Believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything” combines allusion to Kaepernick’s protest with a wider call for protest and values in the juxtaposed generic terms “something” and “everything”. The connotations of “believe” and “sacrificing” add an almost spiritual level to the message, and the didactic tone gives a sense of urgency and ethical responsibility. The vector through Kaepernick’s face means that we follow down from this copy to the Nike slogan and logo. “Just do it” becomes more than Nike’s call to be authentic and brave in the sports field; it becomes a call to action in the face of injustice.

Thus, Nike combines visual and textual elements to align its brand with pressing social issues. Embracing a controversial moment and figure, it sparks debate and raises brand awareness. The stylistic choices result in an ethos-filled inspirational text that will surely appeal to its audience of conscientious sports fans and players.

Sources

Nike (2018), Dream Crazy — Just Do It 30th anniversary campaign featuring Colin Kaepernick [Advertisement], Wieden+Kennedy.

Miller, J. H. (1943), We Can Do It! [Poster], Westinghouse Electric / War Production Co-Ordinating Committee. Available at: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:We_Can_Do_It!.jpg (opens in a new tab) (Public domain).